Even if Ban Ki-Moon demonstrates the personal qualities and character necessary to respond to global challenges and tackle dangerous problems that defy the efforts of others, the United Nations will remain a democratic institution that has become dominated by nation-states that do not practice democracy at home.
The UN General Assembly is widely expected to approve Ban Ki-Moon as the eighth Secretary-General of the United Nations. Moon, who currently serves as South Korea’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, won approval from all five permanent members of the UN Security Council last week. If approved by the General Assembly he would take office on January 1, 2007.
Will Moon be an improvement on Kofi Annan? When Annan was selected as Secretary-General in 1997 few thought he could do worse than Boutros-Boutros Ghali. But Annan’s legacy of the oil for food scandal, sex for food scandal among UN peacekeepers in the Congo, the UN withdrawal from Iraq after the bombing of their headquarters, not to mention his failure in dealing with the nuclear proliferation efforts of Iran and North Korea, clearly demonstrate he was less to the task.
Some of Annan’s defenders would argue that the UN Secretary-General and by extension the UN are only as powerful as their members allow them to be. Major General (now Canadian Senator) Romeo Dallaire comes to mind with regard to this point of view. There is certainly a kernel of truth to this sentiment. Annan has lobbied the UN Security Council to approve a UN peacekeeping force to alleviate the situation in Darfur, but despite these steps Sudan has refused to admit UN peacekeepers inside its borders.
If the UN Secretary-General is powerless to stop the genocide in Darfur or at the very minimum set into action the means necessary to stop the genocide, one must ask if the UN Secretary-General really matters.
Recently I read an article on this topic in the September/October 2006 edition of Foreign Affairs by Sir Brian Urquhart. The article, titled “The Next Secretary-General: How to Fill a Job With No Description,” is simultaneously amusing and asinine. Urquhart, who served as UN Undersecretary-General from 1972 to 1986, insists the UN oil for food program “was later the subject of a grossly exaggerated 'scandal' from which the UN and its leadership are still trying to recover.” However, Urquhart does offer some insight into the achievements of Dag Hammarskjöld, the UN Secretary-General from 1952 until his death in a plane crash in 1961.
Urquhart highlights Hammarskjöld’s successful efforts in 1955 to win the release of 17 U.S. airmen who were shot down by the Chinese in the latter part of the Korean War. The following year Hammarskjöld, on the recommendation of Lester Pearson, Canada’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, established the UN Emergency Forces to stabilize the situation during the Suez Crisis. These achievements prompted the press to coin the phrase, “Leave it to Dag.” Urquhart wrote, “It confirmed that the secretary-general was in a unique position to tackle dangerous problems that defied the efforts of others.”
So will the press at some point quip, “Leave it to Moon?”
According to Urquhart, when searching for a new Secretary-General one must emphasize “basic personal qualities and the capacity to respond to challenges rather than on specific qualifications, on character and potential rather than on specific experience.” Simply put the UN Secretary-General matters only as much as the person who is filling the position.
So does Ban Ki-Moon possess the basic personal qualities and the capacity to respond to challenges facing the UN and the world it purports to represent? It depends on whom you ask.
In an article that appeared in the October 6th edition of The Guardian, it was reported that UN staff were not enthused by the incoming Secretary-General. One anonymous official said of Moon, “He is pretty faceless and does not have much charisma. Kofi, for all his problems, is a man of considerable dignity, political insight and wide international experience.”
But for all his talk of reforming the UN, Kofi Annan was and is a creature of the UN as he has spent his entire career in the UN. How could someone so embedded in the culture of the UN possibly reform it? It’s not that UN staff are necessarily miffed with Moon as much as it is a matter of Annan being the devil they knew and who knew his disciples.
One must wonder though how Moon will handle the question of North Korea. Moon is part of a South Korean government that is committed to rapprochement with North Korea through its “sunshine policy.” According to an article written by Alykhan Velshi of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, when Condoleezza Rice referred to North Korea as an “outpost of tyranny” during her confirmation hearings for Secretary of State, she was rebuked by Moon, who said Rice’s remarks “would never help create an atmosphere of dialogue.”
Moon’s position on North Korea is especially important given North Korea’s renewed threats to test nuclear missiles and that this past weekend North Korean troops crossed the center line of the demilitarized zone between North and South Korea, prompting South Korean troops to fire warning shots. Would Moon use his good offices to get North Korea back to six party talks with the United States, China, Japan, South Korea and Russia? Or would he negotiate directly with Kim Jong-Il? Could Moon persuade the North Koreans to rejoin the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and abandon their nuclear ambitions? Or will Moon say that Kim Jong-Il is a man with whom he can do business? Or would he take on the Democratic Party position and pressure the Bush Administration to hold bilateral talks with North Korea? Even if this current crisis with the North Koreans passes it will not be the last time they threaten to test nuclear weapons, and Moon will have to address the issue if he is to be worth his salt.
Moon will also have to address Iran, Darfur and the reputation of UN peacekeepers after the fiasco in the Congo. Let us also not forget the UN’s own transparency, so that there is not a repeat of the oil for food scandal. How will Moon uphold the UN Charter? Will he implore the Security Council and the General Assembly to once and for all define terrorism? Moon will also be expected to confront new global problems that arise.
Frankly, my expectations are not very high. Even if Ban Ki-Moon should exceed those expectations and demonstrate the personal qualities and character necessary to respond to global challenges and tackle dangerous problems that defy the efforts of others, the United Nations will remain a democratic institution that has become dominated by nation-states that do not practice democracy at home.
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